The goal of the freshman INQ class was to get us to “immerse” ourselves in the college experience. Such experiences include being able to handle multiple tasks at a time, being able to solve problems on our own, not being afraid to ask questions or take risks, learning how to grapple with things that may be difficult, finding our creative sides, learning from our failures, taking ownership of our own learning, and being able to apply abstract concepts to our everyday lives. That is a lot to be thrown at college freshmen, who have maybe never had to deal with most or any of these experiences. While all of this seems complex and a lot to handle, I have been able to conquer most, if not all of these expectations for myself.
Juggling multiple tasks
This semester I got acquainted with multi tasking better than I ever had before. I would have multiple papers due on the same day, a paper and a project due on the same day, and especially on weekends I would have my two blogs for INQ due by Saturday night, a short blurb essay due on Monday for History, sometimes a journal entry due for my Theatre class on Monday, and whatever would be due for Tuesday since I get home late on Mondays and do not have a lot of time to do work when I get home. I used to think that multi tasking was easy, and sometimes it is (i.e. listening to music while doing homework). However, when there are several assignments that all need to be done by the same time is when multi tasking becomes a little more severe than walking and chewing gum.
INQ has taught me that there are many different ways to view a situation. Everyone deals with issues in his or her own way. If there is one thing I learned about being a problem solver, it is that there is no one way to solve a problem!
Ask questions
I have always been the type of person who does not like to ask for help, I like to do things on my own and figure it out, otherwise I feel incapable. I learned though, that it is just the opposite. It would be silly of me to not ask questions or not ask for help because if I don’t ask, I don’t learn.
Take risks
In college there are many opportunities and experiences. It is important to take risks to gain knowledge about something as well as to broaden our horizons with experiences different than that of what we are used to. It is also important to take risks with assignments and work that we get in college because we can learn from the risks we take whether they are good risks or bad risks. A risk taken may be a good one and may bring about a better grade, or a risk can be a bad one and may bring about a worse grade than we had. Either way, we learn from our risks and learn what to do and what not do to again.
College is much more difficult than high school. One of the biggest difficulties that freshman in college have to deal with is the transition from high school to college. For my own personal endeavor of entering college, I had to get used to commuting a half hour to and from Southern every day. When I was in high school, my trip would literally be thirty seconds up the road to get to school.
I also had to become acclimated to the different scheduling of college classes. In college, classes can be dispersed all throughout the day. In high school, a student’s day starts at about 7:30 a.m. and goes to about 2:00 p.m. and includes six to seven classes a day. My earliest class this semester is 9:35 a.m. and my latest class ends at 7:30 p.m. but I only have a couple classes a day. This was a little hard to get used to, but I like it a lot better than I liked high school scheduling.
Be creative
In college creativity is a big part surviving socially as well as academically. People are usually drawn to those who are creative because they seem to be more exciting and someone interesting to be around. The same holds true for being creative academically. Meeting the requirements and doing what is expected on an assignment deserves a decent grade. However, it is the extras that put an assignment over the top and deserves an excellent grade. Learning how to use imovie this semester will allow me to make future projects and assignments more exciting and original. It will make my work stand out more than others…hopefully! With being creative, though comes risk. It is risky to be creative because creativity can either help or hinder an assignment or first impression on someone else. However, without taking creative risks, one will never know what the outcome might have been. The creative risk might have been the one thing that got him the job or grade, or the one thing that did not get him the job or grade, but by playing it safe, he will never know.
Learn from failure
As ridiculous as it may sound, failure can be a good thing. No one wants to fail at something, but sometimes we learn best from our failures. If we fail at something, we are likely to remember what it was that caused us to fail; therefore we can remember not to do that certain thing again. I have been very fortunate this semester so far and have not failed anything yet…let’s hope that continues through finals! In INQ this semester, we talked about failure and the outcomes of failure and whether it brings about a positive or negative experience. I do know that for myself, when I fail, it makes me want to improve for next time, or the next assignment almost to prove that I can pick myself back up again and conquer it.
Take ownership over learning
All throughout school up through high school, we were taught that teachers are responsible for making sure that the students know and learn the material. They would chase us down to turn in our work and really took responsibility for us. However, in college it is quite the opposite. It is not the professors’ jobs to make sure that we learn the material it is our responsibility. They could care less if we turn in our work because it is not their responsibility to make sure that we do. If we don’t turn something in, it is just less for them to have to grade. I had to take ownership over learning in my history class. I have never done exceptionally well in history, so I wanted to make sure that I was doing well in class. My professor does not like to discuss grades because he is “uninterested” in them and “could care less” about what grade we have in his class. I went to his office hours to ask him how I was doing in his class knowing that he does not like to discuss grades, so I had to finagle the question in a different context to learn that I was actually doing well in the class. It is important for students to know what their professors are like regarding the class so that they know how to communicate with them.
Apply abstract concepts to everyday life
In INQ we talk a lot about abstract ideas and concepts that can be applied to our everyday lives. In doing this, we are gaining a new and more collegiate outlook on our lives and various situations. If we allow ourselves to think abstractly, we will make ourselves more worldly in a way because we have such I higher order way of thinking that will allow us to stand out from the crowd.
I found that I have grown over the semester as a student in that I know what is expected of me and know what I need to do. I would say that I need to keep track of my assignments a little better, as I have let myself slip with work a little in this class. Remembering and time management are two of my biggest weaknesses, so I think that a good thing for me to do would be to write down all of my assignments according to when they are due and figure out what needs to take priority over everything else. This coincides with one of my personal goals for the remainder of my time in college. This goal is to not have to rush to get an assignment finished on time. I would like to be one of those students who starts projects and assignments early and works on them a little at a time in order to get them done in a timely manner and not have to worry about anything the night before they are due except if I want to make small last minute adjustments.
Another one of my personal goals for college is to come out of my comfort zone of not getting involved in things and actually start becoming more involved. Even if it is just a small group or organization, I would like to try to break out of my stereotypical commuter ways and instead of going to class and then leaving, I would maybe like to be a part of something at Southern.
As of right now, I have no regrets about my college experience so far. The way I see it is that I have at least seven more semesters to have experiences and make memories, and I can’t regret anything because my journey through college is far from over. I can say that one thing I will not regret is blogging. I really enjoyed finding my voice through blogging. I may not have completed all of the blog assignments, and may not have always enjoyed the topics that we had to blog about, but it is fun to post views and ideas and experiences for other people to see and hopefully become enlightened from it. I am still not quite sure as to who I am or what may define me, but it sure will be a fun experience to find out!
